The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology

Jonathan Marks

In The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology, author Jon Marks presents an innovative framework for thinking about the major issues in the field with fourteen original essays designed to correlate to the core chapters in standard textbooks. Each chapter draws on and complements--but does not reconstitute (except for the sake of clarity)--the major data and ideas presented in standard texts. Marks explores such topics as how we make sense of data about our origins, where our modern ideas comes from, our inability to separate natural facts from cultural facts and values as we try to understand ourselves, and the social and political aspects of science as a culturally situated mental activity.

The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology

Jonathan Marks

Description

In The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology, author Jon Marks presents an innovative framework for thinking about the major issues in the field with fourteen original essays designed to correlate to the core chapters in standard textbooks. Each chapter draws on and complements--but does not reconstitute (except for the sake of clarity)--the major data and ideas presented in standard texts. Marks explores such topics as how we make sense of data about our origins, where our modern ideas comes from, our inability to separate natural facts from cultural facts and values as we try to understand ourselves, and the social and political aspects of science as a culturally situated mental activity.

Features

* Offers clear, intelligent, and
completely original discussions-injected with a sense of humor-that will keep students reading* Addresses core topics in a way that does not simply mirror what is in the basic textbooks but offers a new spin, thereby fostering critical thinking* Complements traditional textbooks in biological anthropology and explores connections between biological and general anthropology* Provides expert integration of topics, coherent narratives, and salient examples* Utilizes theme statements at the start of each chapter that introduce the breadth of information covered and engage students in the material

The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology

Jonathan Marks

Table of Contents

Preface

1. What Is Anthropology, What Is Biological Anthropology, and Should I Be Getting Science Credit for This? (On the Philosophy of Science) What is Anthropology? The Subfields of Anthropology The Anthropology of Science The Normative View of Science: Scientific Method The Social Matrix of Science Relativizing Science The Origins of Anthropology The Origins of Physical Anthropology Biological Anthropology Today References and Further Reading

2. Where Did Our Scientific Ideas about Ourselves Come From? (On the History of Science) The Beginnings of a New View of Nature The Scientific Revolution The Decline of Degeneration The Anatomy of a Biblical Fallibility, or at Least
Incompleteness Monogenism Cause and Effect The Great Chain of Being Buffon's Objection to the Nested Hierarchy Extinction Natural Theology Uniformitarian Geology Adam's World Human Evolution References and Further Reading

3. Can You Tell If You Are a Darwinist? (On Theories of Evolution) Darwin's Argument Where People Fit In The Sacrifice Implications for PatternImplications for SpeciesImplications for Biological HistoryImplications for Relating Humans to Other AnimalsPhylogeny: The Core of DarwinismOther DarwinismsSocial DarwinismNeo-DarwinismThe Evolution at the Molecular LevelPunctuated EquilibriaSociobiologyUniversal
DarwinismAtheistic DarwinismReferences and Further Reading

5. Are We Here? If So, Why? (On Issues of Microevolution)Do Things Exist for a Reason? Principal Abstraction: The Gene Pool Gene FlowInbreedingNatural SelectionGenetic
DriftSickle-CellWhy Is the Gene Pool the Way It Is?Adaptation or Founder Effect?Another Point Illustrated by Sickle-Cell and Phenylketonuria Sickle-Cell, Tay-Sachs, and Genetic ScreeningKinship as a Biocultural Construction Genetic History and the Diversity ProjectWho Owns the Body?References and Further Reading

6. Building Better Monkeys, or at Least Different Ones (On Systematics)SpeciationSpecific Mate Recognition SystemsGenetic Systems Producing IncompatibilitySpecies as IndividualsLevels and Rates of EvolutionDevelopmental Genetics Allometric GrowthExtinctionClassificationSystematics and PhylogenyClassical and Cladistic TaxonomyPhylogenetics Limitations of the
Phylogenetic MethodReferences and Further Reading

7. Is That an Ape in Your Genes, or Are You Just Glad to See Me? (On the Place of Humans in the Natural Order)Primate ClassificationProblems of UniformitarianismGenetic and Anatomical DataThe MammalsOur Place in Primate SystematicsThe Living ApesThe TrichotomyCladism, Reductionism, and the Rise of the HomininsWhat Does It Mean to Be 98% Genetically Chimpanzee? References and Further Reading

8. Apes Run around Naked, Live in Trees, and Fling their Poo. Do You? (On the Relevance of apes to Understanding Humans)What Primates Can and Can't Tell UsPrimate FieldworkPrimates in GroupsSocial Behavior and EcologyFoodSexual Activity and
ParenthoodModels for Human EvolutionBaboons in the Sixties, Chimps in the Nineties Looking Elsewhere for Clues about Human EvolutionThe Ape MindCultureConservation References and Further Reading

9. Being and Becoming (On the Relevance of Humans to Understanding Humans)Human NatureThe Most Fundamental Human Adaptation: BipedalismWhy Be Bipedal?The Second Fundamental Human Adaptation: The TeethWhy Reduce the Canines?The Third Fundamental Human Adaptation: The BrainWhy Be Big-Brained?Social and Life-History NoveltiesPhysiological and Sexual NoveltiesWhat Does It Take to Make a Scenario of Human Evolution Valuable? Cultural EvolutionReferences and Further Reading

10. If History
is Humanities, and Evolution is Science, What Is Paleoanthropology? (On the Assumptions of a Diachronic Science)Scientific Inferences across TimeSkeletal BiologySexual DimorphismOntogenyGeographic VariationPaleopathologySources of Morphological VariationLumping and SplittingFossilization Other ConsiderationsRights and Responsibilities in PaleoanthropologyKinds of EvidenceSuperposition and AssociationDatingDoing the Best We Can with Lost DataMaking Sense of Human AncestryClassifying the Living Apes and Fossil AncestorsReferences and Further Reading

11. The Dental and the Mental (On Making Sense of the Early Diversification of the Human Lineage)The Shadow of Piltdown ManA Hominid
OriginDiscovery of the AustralopithecinesAustralopithecus: Basal BipedsParanthropus-The Dental AdaptationEarly Homo: The Mental AdaptationThe Beginning of Cultural EvolutionReferences and Further Reading

12. What to Do When Confronted by a Neandertal (On Continuity and Discontinuity)The Human LineageThe Mental and Social Life of Homo erectusHomo sapiens, the Wise SpeciesNeandertal LifeAnatomically Modern People The Emergence of ArtThe Political Nature of AncestryTesting Paleontological Models GeneticallyReferences and Further Reading

13. Just How Different is Different? (On Race)RacePatterns of Contemporary Human VariationWhy Do We See Races?Race as a Biocultural
CategoryAsking Scientific Questions about Human DiversityRace Is to Ethnicity as Sex Is to Gender, But Not QuiteWhat Is Innate?Patterns of Human Genetic and Behavioral VariationReferences and Further Reading

14. Nature/Culture, or How Science Consistently Manages to Give Little Answers to Big Questions (On the Non-reductive Core of Anthropology) Adaptability and the Human ConditionFolk Theories of HeredityThe State of the SpeciesThe Anthropology of ScienceBioethicsNAGPRA: Who Owns the Bones?Origin Myths, Scientific and OtherwiseBiocultural Studies, or Cyborg AnthropologyReferences and Further Reading

Index

The Alternative Introduction to Biological Anthropology

Jonathan Marks

Author Information

Jon Marks is Professor of Anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He is a past president of the General Anthropology Division of the American Anthropological Association and was the recipient of the AAA/Mayfield Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. He is the author of Why I Am Not a Scientist: Anthropology and Modern Knowledge (2009); What It Means to Be 98% Chimpanzee: Apes, People, and Their Genes (2002), which won the 2003 W. W. Howells Prize from the Biological Anthropology Section of the American Anthropological Association and the 2009 J. I. Staley Prize from the School for Advanced Research; and Human Biodiversity: Genes, Race, and History (1995).